Wednesday, 26 November 2014

Dan Atherton builds first ever Red Bull Hardline

DAN ATHERTON BUILDS FIRST
EVER RED BULL HARDLINE

Nine of the world’s greatest
bike handlers come to race the most-challenging timed downhill race the world
has ever seen

In the glorious sunshine of
early September, nine of the world’s greatest bike-handlers travelled to the
stunning Dyfi valley in Mid-Wales to ride and race on one of the most difficult
mountain bike tracks ever created, Red Bull Hardline.

The track, designed and built by Dan Atherton, was created to smash the
limits of Downhill Mountain Bike riding and push the sport to the next level.

The 570m descent incorporated more
features per metre than ever before. The track was so intense that nine of the most
accomplished riders in the world spent two days riding together learning to
tackle each section before anybody put together a full run.

There was no red tape and no limits
on discipline: Dan and Gee Atherton, Danny Hart, Sam Dale, Loic Bruni, Brendan
Fairclough, Nico Vink, Joe Smith, Mike Jones and Gareth Brewin spent three days
mastering the track that all agreed was “totally intimidating and totally
exhilarating”.

One of the course’s most spectacular features was a 60ft road gap but
it also included massive dirt jumps, awkward hips, rock gardens and tight,
technically difficult wooded sections.

Dan and Gee have long dreamt
of creating a race with absolutely no restrictions or red-tape. Gee said “A lot of us feel that we can ride most World Cups these days with
one eye shut; you don’t even feel anxious for the first run, we’ll just ride
down blind, first go. Riding the Red Bull Hardline course made all of us nervous again, it
was definitely not a track that you could just jump on and blaze down. It was a
combination of how hard the sections were and how many sections were crammed in
there back to back that made it so gnarly. This track is amazing, it definitely
brought out the best in all the riders and pushed us more than we're used to. It’s
great to be able to showcase exactly what we could do.”

After a day and a half practice
(which saw Mike Jones having to withdraw after injuring his hand) qualification
was structured so that riders could put in a several runs and take their best
time. Dan said “We wanted it to feel as relaxed as possible – the only pressure
on the riders came from within.”

In Qualifying Run 1 only Danny Hart
was close to race speed; he pulled off a 4-minute run while Brendan, Gee and
Dan were at 7 minutes plus and the rest of the field didn’t finish a full run.
By Run 2, Gee posted 3.45 with Dan 3 seconds behind him and Danny a close third.

Qualifying Run 3 saw the fastest
time of the day from Gee at 3:40 with Danny at 3.45, and Brendan and Dan on
3.48. Danny, Loic, Joe, Brendan and Gareth Brewin went for one more run, but
nobody could touch Gee’s 3.40.

Sam Dale had a tough couple of days
with plenty of offs in practice. In his
qualifying run, he took “one of the gnarliest crashes of the year” and had to
watch the Finals from the sidelines.

When it came to Finals, the atmosphere changed up a gear. Gee had qualified first so he was last on the hill for the big race.
Danny was in 2nd, Loic was in 3rd, Brendan was in 4th
and Dan in 5th.

Dan put in a tremendous run of 3:41.491 to take the hot seat and neither Loic or Brendan
could match him but second-placed qualifier Danny Hart went ahead of Dan by 2.4
seconds. Gee Atherton was last man
left on the hill and expectations were sky high for an awesome Finals run. Gee came out fast; he showed incredible speed to
go up on Danny Hart by two whole seconds at the first split but he punctured in
the middle section and failed to finish the race.

Speaking after his victory,Danny Hart said: “I was really happy
to be a part of this awesome event. Only a few selected riders were invited and
I was ecstatic to be one of those! The course was incredible, scary and
difficult; usually tracks of this kind have average sections linking up the
jumps, but Dan did an amazing job of making the sections link together
seamlessly and scaring the living daylights out of us!”

Dan Atherton said:“This
is something that me and Gee have dreamt about for years as the tracks we built
became progressively tougher. It was only brought to reality through the vision
and support of Red Bull and the work ethic of main builder Olly Davey who was
up on that mountain at all hours and in all weathers. To see it all come
together on the day was an incredible feeling and it felt like a big step
forward for mountain biking. I can't wait for next year as we push on with our
quest for the ultimate ride!"